Outlaw
by happy2lie
Summary: Kim is the prime suspect for the murder of an asylum-seeking felon. Unfortunately she has no memory of the crime, and as even Kim's closest friends begin to doubt her innocence, Drakken and Shego somehow become her only hope.
1. Chapter 1

_Summary: Kim is the prime suspect for the murder of an asylum-seeking felon. Unfortunately she has no memory of the crime, and as even Kim's closest friends begin to doubt her innocence, Drakken and Shego somehow become her only hope._

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_Warning: This has a bit of a grisly start, but I do not intend for blood and gore to be a theme of the future chapters._

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_Feedback: I love it. I'm newly addicted to this fandom and would love to know how I am received. _

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_Disclaimer: Characters not mine, but the story is :)_

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**1**

Pain was the first thing she registered, after the strange, swimming blackness slowly sifted into shapes and colours. Unbearable, head-splitting pain that made her feel as if she could burst, and she cried out only to find that her throat was too dry to make a sound.

Somehow, amid the scrabbling she must've been doing, doubled-over in pain, sprawling on the cold tiles of the floor, her hand scooped through a slippery, sticky pool of liquid. She stopped writhing for a second – her eyes, she was hardly able to open them the light was so bright – and brought her hand closer to her face.

_Focus. _

No, it was too hard, too bright.

She blinked sore, heavy eyelids.

_Focus. _

Her vision swam, blurring and fogging like breath on a window. But she saw it, somehow, through the brightness and searing pain – the dark, deep red of blood. So thick it was almost black.

_My blood?_

She instinctively touched her other hand to her head, patting and smoothing, checking for injury, skimming briefly down her torso and legs.

Her hand came away clean.

As her vision slowly became clearer she realised she didn't know where she was. The room was unfamiliar, magnolia walls around her and cheap linoleum tiling beneath her. And more blood – _a lot more blood_ – smeared across the smoothness of the floor in sprawling arcs.

There had been a struggle.

She hauled herself onto her hands and knees, her head objecting to the movement with sharp, stabbing pains of protest. Her hands slipped and squeaked through the blood as she crawled forwards, agonizingly slowly, following the blood trail from the tiles through to the carpet of the next room.

She didn't know if she screamed when she saw it.

It was almost too horrific to even make a sound, the way it was laying, all strange and angular, an arm bent the wrong way, another hacked off at the wrist, the throat torn open with the head bent back from the broken stem of its neck and the stomach split from chest to groin – everything inside it spilling idly out over the legs.

The pain resurged with the force of a sucker-punch to the temple.

And then blackness.

...

The metal of the cuffs scraped against the table leg. They restricted her movement, her hands secure under the table top, making her hunch over. She had struggled feebly against her restraints at first, but had given up soon after, choosing instead to glare at the two-way glass ahead of her.

She looked round at the sound of the door unlocking, her eyes following the slow, measured progress of the police officer as he moved across the room to the desk. He gave a heavy, laboured sigh and sat down on the other side of the table to face her.

He looked at her hard and leaned forwards, his elbows on the desk and his fingers steepled. Kim looked down, unable to hold his stare. She looked down at her own cuffed hands, hauntingly red from the blood they had not permitted her to wash off before her interrogation. This was the third officer she'd had sit in front of her, shout at her, reason with her, point and yell and demand to know what happened.

But her answer was always the same. She just didn't know.

'If you continue to be uncooperative little lady, we're going to have to resort to more drastic methods,' the officer drawled.

Kim clenched her jaw. _Little lady_. She thought about the body, its missing hand and its spilled guts.

The officer leaned back in his chair, his legs spread wide and his shirt straining over his round belly.

'Right,' he said, tapping his hands lightly on the surface of the table. 'Solitary it is then, until you feel like talking.'

He uncuffed her briefly, to slip the restraints from the table, and recuffed her a second later. He smelt of smoke and coffee as he leant over her, and Kim held her breath until he was done. He hauled her up with a thick strong hand around the top of her arm. She felt her skin bruising beneath his grip. She was pushed through the door he opened and out into the corridor, dragged along quicker than she wanted to walk, marched past endless doors to nameless rooms.

She closed her eyes and willed herself to wake up, telling herself for the hundredth time that day that it was all just a bad dream.

...

There was an explosion.

Not a huge one. Not enough to crumble the walls. Kim's extensive knowledge told her that it couldn't have been much more than a small smoke grenade, but she instinctively dived for cover, and in doing so unintentionally flipped her accompanying officer over to crash forcefully into the wall, his head connecting with the masonry with a sickening crack and knocking him out cold instantly.

'_Shit!_' Kim rushing to crouch at his side, wafting away the smoke that was beginning to roll through the corridor.

She looked up sharply at the sound of a scathing laugh.

'Nice move,' said a voice appreciatively. Kim squinted through the smoke, making out the distinctive abstract blocks of black and green, until the smoke finally cleared enough to reveal the sleek, poised form of her addressor.

'_Shego_?' Kim asked, feeling oddly relieved to see the familiar face.

'Doy,' the woman replied dismissively, glancing apathetically at the injured officer before looking at Kim again. 'Haven't seen Dr. D have you Princess? I lost him about four hours ago and figured he might've got his blue-butt hauled in here.'

Kim shook her head mutely, looking back down at the officer who still hadn't stirred but quickly turning her head in the other direction at the quick, heavy slapping of footsteps that rang down the corridor. Urgent voices yelled things like 'STOP!' and 'POLICE!' and 'DROP YOUR WEAPON!' – phrases that under any normal circumstances Kim would've felt reassured to hear.

But now they just filled her with a resentful, twisting fear.

Shego just sighed like the whole event was nothing more than a slightly irritating inconvenience and, without even really looking, swiftly flicked her hands to fire glowing balls of green plasma through the smoke. The yells escalated in volume and frequency, and there were several heavy bangs as unconscious bodies slapped against the walls and floor, and then there was silence.

'Police,' Shego muttered scornfully. 'What a shambolic outfit. I mean, why do they even bother?' She twitched her lips thoughtfully. 'Any idea which way the evidence room is?' she asked, a flicker of humour in her expression until she finally caught sight of Kim's hands. The smirk dropped immediately from her features and her eyes widened in shock. '_Cuffs _Princess?' she asked, recovering quickly from her initial shock to smirk conspiratorially before tsking. 'Has somebody been naughty?'

'Shut up Shego,' Kim spat, unable to keep the quiver out of her voice.

'Oh this is just _too_ _good,_' Shego continued, her voice as delighted as Kim had ever heard it. 'What did you do?' she probed. 'C'mon, tell me ... steal a My Little Pony dream house from Smartymart?'

Kim stood up from her crouch and advanced towards Shego menacingly, anger and desperation coursing through her like poison.

'Aw c'mon Kimmie – what are you gonna do? Your hands are _literally_ tied.' She gestured to Kim's restraints with a wicked grin, but her expression once again transformed at the sight of the blood stains all over Kims arms and clothes.

'Holy crap ...' Shego took a step back, staring a little longer at the blood before looking back up at Kim. 'What happened?' she asked in shocked bewilderment.

'I ... I don't know,' Kim stammered, her throat constricting painfully. 'I woke up in the room with this ... this ...' she couldn't even say it.

A flicker of what could've been mistaken for genuine concern flashed across Shego's features.

'He was ... in _pieces_,' Kim forced the words out. 'And ... and then I'm dragged _here_ and they won't let me call anyone or even ...' she scowled, her voice lowering to a whisper that forced Shego to lean in closer, 'they won't even let me wash it off,' her cuffed hands scratched desperately against each other.

Shego frowned at her before looking up sharply at the sound of more voices. 'Looks like they're wheeling in the back-up Kimmie,' she said, '_finally_,' she added.

Kim just looked at her.

'That's my cue to leave, so I'm gonna...' Shego gestured behind her with a thumb.

Kim didn't move.

Shego sighed and agitatedly ran a hand through her hair. 'You're just gonna wait here til they drag you back in that interrogation room?' she asked.

Kim swallowed.

Shego rolled her eyes. 'For God's sake Princess,' she muttered as she yanked Kim's hands towards her.

Kim felt a brief swell of white-hot pain around her wrists and yelped, snatching her hands back to her chest. The cuffs landed with a metallic clink on the floor.

'I know you're all busy being traumatised or whatever right now,' Shego said, 'but if you know what's good for you, you should follow me.' And with that, the thief turned and ran, leaving Kim to stare at her newly liberated hands.

Another self-important announcement of 'POLICE! DROP YOUR WEAPON!' rang through the smoke-filled corridor and, acting on instinct more than any sort of rational thought, Kim turned and ran straight after Shego.


	2. Chapter 2

_Thanks for the reviews :) I'm totally encouraged to continue with this story after reading your comments. I hope this next chapter holds everyone's interest!_

**2**

Shego felt a strange prickling sense comprised of both nervousness and relief to notice that the girl appeared to be following her. Had she really just liberated _Kim Possible _from incarceration? What was she _thinking_? Sure she was used to breaking people out of jail, but she tried to limit her client-base to people who weren't actively trying to put _her _in it. She swung herself up effortlessly onto the metal cabinets that lined the corridor, clear of the smoke that gathered closer to the floor. She heard a hollow clang as Kim landed a few paces behind her, slightly less gracefully.

_Must be the shock, _thought Shego. Shock does that to you – makes your body all strange and heavy and stiff. Shock from whatever Kim had seen. _All that blood_. She sprang forwards when she reached the end of the cabinets, grabbing at the metal frame of the high-level open window she had got in through, barely a foot and a half wide. She slipped through it like she was made of water, twisting to hang onto the external sill with one hand before dropping silently onto the roof below.

She paused for a beat, unsure if she should wait for Kim, who appeared through the window a second later and dangled hesitantly for a few seconds more, her legs scrambling desperately against the wall.

_Panic. _Shego recognised it.

'Uh yeah, we don't have all day here,' Shego called up agitatedly to the flailing redhead, her sensitive hearing picking up on nearby movement.

'I can't do it!' Kim shouted back down to her, the muscles in her arms straining as she tried to haul herself back up onto the sill.

'Are you _kidding_?' Shego asked incredulously. 'It's like a four-foot drop!' She was lying, but it wouldn't have made any difference.

'I'm serious Shego, I can't do it,' came the response.

'C'mon Princess, I've seen you jump out of _moving aircraft _to barge in and ruin the day,' Shego told her. 'If you can't make this jump I'm officially going to have an existential crisis.'

Kim's desperate struggling seemed to still slightly at Shego's strange brand of reassurance. She finally loosed the grip of one of her hands and used it to push herself off the wall slightly, twisting at the waist so that she could look at Shego. 'Come closer,' she requested, nodding to the space directly beneath her.

'Oh _come on_,' Shego snapped back, unimpressed.

'Please ... I can't do it otherwise,' Kim pleaded as her white-knuckled hand gripped impossibly tighter around the concrete lip of the sill; her eyes were wide and earnest, child-like in their sincerity.

Shego sighed heavily, rolling her eyes as she stepped over until she was directly below the girl's dangling legs. 'OK I'm here ... can we go now?' she asked, looking up.

Shego heard the deep, steadying breath that Kim released before she let go, dropping to land almost on top of her, and Shego instinctively raised her arms to guide the girl's sudden descent. Kim gasped sharply as she landed, and Shego automatically steadied the girl against her by tightening her strong arms around the redhead's slim frame. Their eyes met briefly before Shego sprang back violently, reacting to the proximity, wrenching her arms from around the Kim and snapping them back to her sides. She was about to make a comment about how pathetic Kim's hesitancy had appeared, until she caught the streaks of tears scoring trails into the blood and grime on Kim's face. So she just clenched her jaw tightly and turned away, muttering a quiet 'Let's go'.

...

Shego evaded the police effortlessly. Having disabled all the security cameras on her way in, all she had to do traverse the sprawling compound via the roofs and walls until she was sure they weren't being followed. She leapt from roof to roof until finally selecting a fire-escape to lead her back down to the ground near the motorbike she had arrived on.

Kim followed her shakily, gracelessly, missing her footing and skidding or tumbling, finally reaching the fire escape and descending it warily, like she was waiting for it to fall away beneath her feet.

Shego waited for Kim's feet to touch solid ground before she spoke up. 'So how does it feel to be a fugitive?' she asked, grabbing the helmet from the bike and yanking it down onto her head.

'_So not_,' Kim replied. 'There's just been a ...' she fiddled with her hands again, 'mix up.'

Shego expelled a breath of incredulous air as she tucked the stray hairs of her wild mane back into the confines of the helmet, 'Well I'm sure they'll get right on top of sorting that out.'

Kim looked up. 'They _will_,' she said crossly. 'I work for Global Justice, remember? There's no way they'd leave me here to rot in some jail in ...' Kim cut herself off with a gasp and rushed a hand to her mouth.

'What?' Shego asked, despite herself.

Kim was quiet for a moment before replying. 'That's the first thing I've remembered since waking up,' she admitted. 'I'm in Arkansaw.'

'Congratulations,' Shego said, disappointed at the anticlimactic revelation, 'send your Gran a postcard.'

Kim's narrowed her eyes. 'And why are _you _here?' she asked, suddenly suspicious. 'Isn't it a bit coincidental that we're _both_ in the same place at the same time the very day I completely lose my memory and wake up in a room with a ... with a ... a ...' she trailed off.

She still couldn't say it.

Shego tried not to soften at the haunted look that drifted across Kim's features. She held up her hands. 'All Dr. D's doing I'm afraid,' she told the girl. 'He had some 'meeting' here that was 'none of your concern, Shego',' she used finger-quotes to demonstrate her scepticism as she executed an uncannily accurate impression of Drakken's voice. 'I'm just the ride.'

Kim folded her arms. 'That's _all _you know?'

Shego's anger flared at the accusation. 'Even if it wasn't, what makes you think I'd tell you?' she snapped. 'In case you've forgotten, we're not exactly buddies, yeah?'

Kim fell quiet and looked down at her feet. 'Then ... then why did you help me?'

Shego shrugged irritably. She had been wondering the same thing herself. 'I guess I have a soft spot for people on the wrong side of the bars,' she answered.

Kim scowled, dissatisfied with the answer.

Shego rolled her eyes. 'Why don't you ask Nerdlinger,' she suggested, swinging a leg over the bike and settling onto the seat. 'He would've sent you here in the first place, right?'

'They took away my Kimmunicator,' Kim mumbled hopelessly.

'Bummer,' Shego observed helpfully.

Kim looked so dejected in that moment that Shego had to look away. She busied herself with shoving the key into the ignition. The motor choked into life and Kim looked up sharply at the sound.

'Where are you going?' she asked.

'Uh ... home?' Shego answered. 'I'm not sticking around for the boys in blue to show up, and if you had any sense, neither would you.' She revved the engine to emphasise her point.

'Wait!' Kim called, panicked at the prospect of her only ally leaving.

Shego heaved a sigh turned her head to face Kim, looking smaller and frailer than she had ever seen her, hugging her arms across her chest.

'Where will I go?' Kim asked.

Shego shrugged. 'That, Kimmie, is _not_ my problem,' she told the girl before speeding away in a cloud of diesel fumes and dust, and for a second she almost believed it to be true.

...

It was late by the time Shego got back. The lair was shadowy and vacuous and her footsteps echoed in the darkness. Shego identified a single active computer screen as the only light source in the entire complex, and moving closer towards it revealed the figure of Dr. Drakken hunched over the equipment, studying something very closely with his fists clenched in his hair.

'Yo Dr. D,' greeted Shego loudly as she flicked a switch on the wall and immediately flooded the complex with fluorescent light. The man jumped at the sudden combination of sensory intrusion before quickly closing whatever window he had had open on the computer screen.

'Ah, hello Shego,' he said, smoothing out his hair and standing up from his seat.

Shego folded her arms and frowned at him. 'And where have _you _been?' she asked.

'Me?' Drakken asked, pointing to his own chest in a motion of affected innocence. 'Oh you know ... just ... catching up on my ...' his hands scrabbled across the desk in search of a suitable item, grabbing at a magazine, 'er ... Fashionista Weekly,' he said uncertainly, reading the title.

Shego snatched the magazine from his grip. 'Stay outta my stuff,' she ordered.

'Sorry,' Drakken said quietly.

'So you've been here since that meeting in Wisconsin?' Shego asked.

'Of course,' Drakken replied without hesitation.

'You're saying you _didn't_ disappear for hours with no trace and not tell me where you were?' she continued to probe.

'Well ... I ... er,' Drakken chuckled nervously, 'I never knew you cared so much.'

'Hmm, cute,' Shego acknowledged. 'So this ridiculous and totally transparent, by the way, charade has nothing to do with Kim Possible ending up in jail for murder, right?' she asked casually.

Drakken paled slightly. 'What? No no ... I have ... jail you say?'

'_Jail for murder_, I said,' Shego corrected.

Drakken scratched awkwardly at his neck, visibly squirming under Shego's stare. 'Well, you know, she careers around with all that _weaponry _... a careless young woman like that ... all _perfume and hormones and ponies and sleepover clubs _...' Drakken stammered.

'Has anyone ever told you that kind of aggressive gender-stereotyping is a sign of uneasiness in your own masculinity?' Shego asked with a frown.

'I just meant that it's a wonder no one has been hurt before,' Drakken snapped.

Shego merely raised a single, accusatory eyebrow at the increasingly flustered Doctor.

'Anyway,' he stretched and yawned dramatically, 'isn't it getting late? I'll just be off to bed.' He glanced at Shego, muttering a quick 'Good night then,' at her silence.

Shego watched him shuffle past her as she leaned back languidly against the desk and appeared to inspect her nails. She let him reach the door before saying 'She busted out, you know.'

Drakken stopped. Shego could see him turn around slowly in her peripheral vision, but she didn't look up. 'She ... uh ... she what?' he asked.

'Kim Possible, she busted out of jail,' Shego said, whipping out a nail file and busily scuffing it across her finger tips.

Drakken's gaze flickered around the cavernous lair for a moment. 'Well ... that's ...' he srunched his his eyes closed in frustration, 'resilient.'

Shego finally looked up. 'Look, we can do this the easy way or the hard way Dr. D,' she said, 'but either way you're going to start telling me _exactly_ what's going on,' she jabbed the nail file in his direction.

Drakken sighed in defeat.


End file.
